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Optimization and Methodology in Software Engineering
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Optimization and Methodology in Software Engineering

A special issue of Information (ISSN 2078-2489). This special issue belongs to the section "Information Theory and Methodology".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 June 2023) | Viewed by 15014

Special Issue Editor

Prof. Dr. Luigi Benedicenti

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Faculty of Computer Science, University of New Brunswick, 550 Windsor Street, Fredericton, NB E3B 5A3, Canada
Interests: emotional contagion in software engineering; agile software processes; decision methods and conflict resolution
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Software engineering methodologies and processes play a vital role in software development because they enable developers to tackle complexity and to focus on the most relevant aspects of the domains in which they develop. As methodologies evolve, so does their optimization. Process tailoring, agile development, conflict resolution, prioritization techniques, decision support methods, and affect management all provide overlapping perspectives. Managing a suite of these techniques is necessary to achieve continual improvement, a goal often sought and rarely reached.

This Special Issue is a vehicle to gather the state of the art in optimizing software development. We seek novel developments in software engineering to manage complexity, to assess or measure the software process, to include the human aspect of software engineering in development methods, and to create continual improvement. Topics of interest include but are not limited to:

  • Affect theory applications to software engineering;
  • Process tailoring methods;
  • Conflict resolution and prioritization;
  • Machine learning approaches to software development;
  • Empirical software engineering;
  • Decision methods;
  • Formal methods for continual process improvement.

In addition to domain-driven contributions, this Special Issue also welcomes submissions with interdisciplinary contributions including affect theory, affective computing, and emotions in software engineering. These papers support the inclusion of an additional aspect augmenting the cognitive and creative perspectives already included in software engineering methods.

Prof. Dr. Luigi Benedicenti
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Information is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • software engineering
  • software process
  • affect theory
  • continual improvement

Related Special Issue

Published Papers (5 papers)

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29 pages, 667 KiB  
Article
Scrum@PA: Tailoring an Agile Methodology to the Digital Transformation in the Public Sector
by Paolo Ciancarini, Raffaele Giancarlo and Gennaro Grimaudo
Information 2024, 15(2), 110; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/info15020110 - 13 Feb 2024
Viewed by 1254
Abstract
Digital transformation in the public sector provides digital services to the citizens aiming at increasing their quality of life, as well as the transparency and accountability of a public administration. Since adaptation to the citizens changing needs is central for its success, Agile [...] Read more.
Digital transformation in the public sector provides digital services to the citizens aiming at increasing their quality of life, as well as the transparency and accountability of a public administration. Since adaptation to the citizens changing needs is central for its success, Agile methodologies seem best suited for the software development of digital services in that area. However, as well documented by an attempt to use Scrum for an important Public Administration in Italy, substantial modifications to standard Agile were needed, giving rise to a new proposal called improved Agile (in short, iAgile). Another notable example is the Scrum@IMI method developed by the City of Barcelona for the deployment of its digital services. However, given the importance of digital transformation in the public sector and the scarcity of efforts (documented in the scholarly literature) to effectively bring Agile within it, a strategically important contribution that Computer Science can offer is a general paradigm describing how to tailor Agile methodologies and, in particular, Scrum, for such a specific context. Our proposal, called Scrum@PA, addresses this strategic need. Based on it, a public administration has a technically sound avenue to follow to adopt Scrum rather than a generic set of guidelines as in the current state of the art. We show the validity of our proposal by describing how the quite successful Scrum@IMI approach can be derived from Scrum@PA. Although iAgile can also be derived from our paradigm, we have chosen Scrum@IMI as a pilot example since it is publicly available on GitHub. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Optimization and Methodology in Software Engineering)
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14 pages, 845 KiB  
Article
Perceived Importance of Metrics for Agile Scrum Environments
by Fernando Almeida and Pedro Carneiro
Information 2023, 14(6), 327; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/info14060327 - 11 Jun 2023
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 2105
Abstract
Metrics are key elements that can give us valuable information about the effectiveness of agile software development processes, particularly considering the Scrum environment. This study aims to learn about the metrics adopted to assess agile development processes and explore the impact of how [...] Read more.
Metrics are key elements that can give us valuable information about the effectiveness of agile software development processes, particularly considering the Scrum environment. This study aims to learn about the metrics adopted to assess agile development processes and explore the impact of how the role performed by each member in Scrum contributed to increasing/reducing the perception of the importance of these metrics. The impact of years of experience in Scrum on this perception was also explored. To this end, a quantitative study was conducted with 191 Scrum professionals in companies based in Portugal. The results show that the Scrum role is not a determining factor, while individuals with more years of experience have a higher perception of the importance of metrics related to team performance. The same conclusion is observed for the business value metric of the product backlog and the percentage of test automation in the testing phase. The findings allow for extending the knowledge about Scrum project management processes and their teams, in addition to offering important insights into the implementation of metrics for software engineering companies that adopt Scrum. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Optimization and Methodology in Software Engineering)
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13 pages, 339 KiB  
Article
Scale Abbreviation with Recursive Feature Elimination and Genetic Algorithms: An Illustration with the Test Emotions Questionnaire
by Sevilay Kilmen and Okan Bulut
Information 2023, 14(2), 63; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/info14020063 - 21 Jan 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1483
Abstract
Psychological scales play a key role in the assessment, screening, and diagnosis of latent variables, such as emotions, mental health, and well-being. In practice, researchers need shorter scales of psychological traits to save administration time and cost. Thus, a variety of optimization algorithms [...] Read more.
Psychological scales play a key role in the assessment, screening, and diagnosis of latent variables, such as emotions, mental health, and well-being. In practice, researchers need shorter scales of psychological traits to save administration time and cost. Thus, a variety of optimization algorithms have been proposed to abbreviate lengthy psychological scales into shorter instruments efficiently. The main goal of this application is to form an abbreviated scale with fewer items while maintaining reliability, relationships among the subscales, and model fit for the full scale. In this study, we use an optimization algorithm (genetic algorithm) and a feature selection algorithm (recursive feature elimination) to abbreviate a psychological scale automatically. Although both algorithms search for an optimal subset of features within a large pool of features, the search mechanism underlying each algorithm is quite different. The genetic algorithm employs a systematic but computationally-expensive sampling process to find the optimal features, whereas recursive feature elimination removes the least important features iteratively until a desired number of features are retained. In this study, we use a 77-item measure of test emotions (Test Emotions Questionnaire) to demonstrate how these algorithms can be used for scale abbreviation. We generate a 40-item short form using each algorithm and compare the quality of the selected items against the full-length scale. The results indicate that both methods can provide researchers and practitioners with a systematic procedure for creating psychometrically sound, shorter versions of lengthy psychological instruments. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Optimization and Methodology in Software Engineering)
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13 pages, 1153 KiB  
Article
Lack of Awareness of IT Adoption and Use Theories by IT/IS Project Managers: Poor Relevance, Unfocused Research or Deficient Education?
by João Varajão, João Álvaro Carvalho, Tiago Silva and Jaime Pereira
Information 2022, 13(2), 48; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/info13020048 - 20 Jan 2022
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 3732
Abstract
Adoption, use, and diffusion of Information Technology (IT) applications, together with their widespread success, are among the most popular topics in Information Systems (IS) research. However, the impact of the acquired understanding of those phenomena on IS practice is not discernible. In fact, [...] Read more.
Adoption, use, and diffusion of Information Technology (IT) applications, together with their widespread success, are among the most popular topics in Information Systems (IS) research. However, the impact of the acquired understanding of those phenomena on IS practice is not discernible. In fact, IT adoption, use, and diffusion are subjects scarcely mentioned in what concerns the practices of IT/IS professionals. This article addresses the question of IT/IS practitioners’ awareness of models and theories regarding the adoption, use, and diffusion of IT applications and their success. It describes two surveys of IT/IS project managers that look into their knowledge on a selected set of models/theories widely addressed in IS research. The results show that these project managers are not aware of IT adoption, use, and diffusion models/theories. The article ends with a discussion that attempts to find justifications for that evidence and stresses out the need for further research focused on translating the extant theoretical models into actionable knowledge. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Optimization and Methodology in Software Engineering)
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19 pages, 2283 KiB  
Systematic Review
Agile Software Requirements Engineering Challenges-Solutions—A Conceptual Framework from Systematic Literature Review
by Zoe Hoy and Mark Xu
Information 2023, 14(6), 322; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/info14060322 - 06 Jun 2023
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 5643
Abstract
Agile software requirements engineering processes enable quick responses to reflect changes in the client’s software requirements. However, there are challenges associated with agile requirements engineering processes, which hinder fast, sustainable software development. Research addressing the challenges with available solutions is patchy, diverse and [...] Read more.
Agile software requirements engineering processes enable quick responses to reflect changes in the client’s software requirements. However, there are challenges associated with agile requirements engineering processes, which hinder fast, sustainable software development. Research addressing the challenges with available solutions is patchy, diverse and inclusive. In this study, we use a systematic literature review coupled with thematic classification and gap mapping analysis to examine extant solutions against challenges; the typologies/classifications of challenges faced with agile software development in general and specifically in requirements engineering and how the solutions address the challenges. Our study covers the period from 2009 to 2023. Scopus—the largest database for credible academic publications was searched. Using the exclusion criteria to filter the articles, a total of 78 valid papers were selected and reviewed. Following our investigation, we develop a framework that takes a three-dimensional view of agile requirements engineering solutions and suggest an orchestrated approach balancing the focus between the business context, project management and agile techniques. This study contributes to the theoretical frontier of agile software requirement engineering approaches and guidelines for practice. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Optimization and Methodology in Software Engineering)
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